Tamil Padam Review: A must watch Family entertainer

Thamizh Padam, a parody of Tamil movies of all times, spares no movies, not even the ones we usually classify to be above all criticisms. Starting from MGR, Sivaji, Jayshankar, Rajini, Kamal to the contemporaries Ajith and Vijay are spoofed in style and tastefully. Having reveled unabashedly in formulaic and melodramatic stereotypes from time unknown, it’s time for us to wake up and – well laugh out loud at ourselves.

The preposterously reoccurring themes of rapes, saviors of peace, retribution, turning around fortunes in one night and one song, ageing heroes playing college students and aged sidekicks playing their college friends are mocked at. And even the often untouched, yet existent themes such as infanticide are not left behind either.

Mirchi Siva plays Siva, who was born in Cinemapatti, the village that kills male infants as soon as they are born fearing the ominous threat of them fleeing the village to the city to become heroes in movies. Siva, as an infant, gets off the vindictive hands of Paravai Muniamma, but eventually flees to the city to realize his movie dreams. He becomes an undercover police officer instead who lives and breathes to protect the civilians.

Siva falls in love in the midst of his business of protecting-the-civilians and his future father-in-law puts forth a condition: amass wealth in just one night (and one song).

With a carefully constructed storyline, aimed at taking potshots on every single stereotype we are so used to (and almost having forgotten what stereotypes are, for their abundance), there are very few dull moments in the movie.

Siva proves to be a revelation. He is a riot and his college friends Nakul (M S Bhaskar), Bharath (Vennira Aadai Moorthy) and Siddharth (Manobala) are a scream. The Boyz scene with Manobala is one of the highlights of the movie. On the downside, the plot employs spoofs of movies from the late seventies and eighties in many places; the viewing pleasure of which is enhanced only if the viewer is familiar with the original. Not that it proves to be a dampener, however.

Amudhan’s research is ingenious and the inventive plot construction deserves special mention. He has wedged almost all famous movies of our times into the plot, taking a leaf out of famous movies including Naattamai, Basha, Annamalai, Talapathi, Kanthaswamy, Vettaikaran, Boyz and Run – not to mention the good old ones. And sequences like girl-raping-a-guy and villain shooting himself to death are sure to bring the roof down.

The fantastic rerecording complements the tone of the movie fittingly and Kannan’s composition for the song Omaha Zeeya is a visual treat in itself.

So grab your popcorn and cola, get yourself a ticket and watch Thamizh Padam with your entire family. If not anything, you might get a hint at how stereotyped our movies are. Who knows, this might even bring about a change in the outlook of our creative heads. For better, hopefully!

Verdict: You ought to watch it!

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